Abstract—Many traditional houses that are still persist in some area of Indonesia is in the verge of extinction. Salvation effort was aroused in order to save civilization heritage, national identity, and local wisdom for future generations. One way is reviving efforts about conserving a la ex-situ in the form of open-air museum. This paper aims to describe critically the implementation of ex-situ conservation towards endangered traditional houses in the form of museum. Critical frameworks that have been built in this research should be as a muse in evolving sustainable open-air museum particularly in Indonesia. By taking case in Stübing freilichmuseum in Austria and Taman Mini Indonesia Indah (TMII) Jakarta, Indonesia, identified some common thread by juxtaposing each cases in order to produce a guideline (practical framework) that can be used as the blue book for the preservation of traditional houses of Indonesia. From the results it was indicated that the problem of mentality and behavior is the main factor why many traditional houses better abandoned and left extinct. Technically, the management is also a challenge that needs improvement in order to increase the quality of Indonesian museum, especially open-air museum. Therefore, the presence of this research is expected to push up the creation of policies that support the preservation of traditional houses to be more planned, integrated and organized

Index Terms—ex– situ conservation, open - air museum, traditional house